Tonight we're gonna party like it's 1699

The Suns
Earl Clark has been sent to the D-League. This is really good because he'll get more playing time there. Hopefully he'll come back with more awesomeocity. It's also cool, because my Earl Clark-fan friend can see him play online, if she wants to.

New JMZ video! I'd like to find video of his dunk. But so far I've come up empty.

I did find this though:


And speaking of video, I'm waiting on video from this.

Other NBA news
It appears that his PR team finally got through to Gilbert Arenas.

WNBA
I never thought of stats as something that were exclusively the providence of men's basketball. Apparently I'm not alone on that, but I am in a very small group of people.

Today marks two months until the start of the WNBA season. It's also 24 days before the draft. So here are two mock WNBA drafts. They both have the Mystics taking a big post presence, which I think would be a great thing. They don't agree on which on, so I guess we'll see.


The Mystics
Last year the Mystics gave a lot of lip service to "creating a culture of winning." I think they got a great start on it, but in case you were wondering what it meant, Swish Appeal is here to help.

The DC Basketcases posted an entry on Saturday that was mostly about the Shock signing Marion Jones but also talked about tomorrow's press conference.

They seem to agree with my theory of it being Katie Smith. My favorite reason is that this picture:












is an awful lot like this one:

Mr. Dinkins, would you please be my mayor?

Again, it's been awhile since my last update. This time it's because I was very sick for about 2 weeks. Blech. Some older links are mixed in here, mostly because I found them interesting and/or important. Enjoy!

The Suns
Saturday's Game One loss against the Spurs was pretty hard to take. To lose a 16 point lead and have it go into two overtimes (one of which happened on a 3-pointer from a 7-footer) before finally losing on a last second shot? Just really hard to swallow. In the post game interviews, the Suns all looked so sad. Shaq was barely audible, and Hill looked like he probably had been crying. It broke my heart.

May Tuesday's game go much better, without dumb fouls and dumber luck.

Game recaps: Associated Press, Arizona Republic, East Valley Tribune

It looks like Diaw is key for this first round matchup (and in my mind, the entire playoff run).

Unrelated to the playoffs, Barbosa met Shaq first when he was 7 years old. They shook hands, and then Shaq broke LB's gym's backboard. It didn't get fixed for a week and a half.

Other NBA
Apparently the new owners of the Sonics had no intent to keep them in Seattle, no matter what they told the NBA or the previous owner. I know this is old news, but it's important context to the fact that the NBA team owners approved the Oklahoma City relocation. A few things stood out to me in the second article.

One: Clay Bennett hopes no one understands the concept of context. Bennett said his words had been misinterpreted. When he wrote, "I am a man possessed! Will do everything we can," he meant he was determined to find a way for the Sonics to remain in the city. Ha!

Two: Bennett is...facing a class-action lawsuit brought by season-ticket holders who say they were duped into buying tickets under the premise the Sonics wouldn't leave. Crazy!

Three: And this week former team owner Howard Schultz announced plans to sue to get the team back, saying Bennett did not make a good-faith effort to secure a new arena deal as he promised when he bought the team in 2006. I'm glad *someone* is paying attention to the emails from the first article, since David Stern seems to be so prone to flattery. Even if Seattlites don't like Schultz either.

The Nuggets had major bus problems on the way to game one. Bad omen there with black smoke and everything.

Isiah Thomas finally got fired, but he's been kept around seemingly for kicks. My friend Anna suggested that this may be to avoid paying out the nose to let him go. Whatever it is, I'm glad he's (mostly) gone to stop the poisoning of that franchise (and the league as a whole).

FIBA and Other International Ball
Here, have an overview of Olympic qualifiers and the Olympic games themselves.

Brazil is optimistic about their chances to get through the Olympic qualifiers. I'm definitely rooting for them.

Tiago Splitter's sister, Michelle, has been dealing with leukaemia for awhile, and recently had a recurrence. I hope her health improves.

Shabtai von Kalmanovic treats the members of his basketball team (Spartak) really really well. That includes Dianna Taurasi, Sue Bird, and Tina Thompson. He has a little more than a smidge of smarm though.

Becky Hammon signs with the Russian national team to play in the Olympics. This was weird to me, until I read that article. She's right, her choices were to sit on my couch and watch the Olympics, or play in the Olympics. It made it an easy decision.

The WNBA
The WNBA draft happened while I was not busy maintaining this blog. It was a pretty awesome (if semi-predictable) draft, and the Mystics got a pretty good (and local!) pick-up in Crystal Langhorne.

The Seattle Storm (who are my preseason guess for a championship) recently entered into a sponsorship deal with Olivia Cruise Line. This is (probably) due in part to their off season pick up of Sheryl Swoopes (longtime spokesperson of Olivia). This is the first time that I know of that a WNBA team has officially entered into any kind of partnership with a high profile member of the lesbian (or gay) corporate community. However! Their press release on this cracked me up and not in a good way. The only time that they mentioned anything about the GLBT nature of Olivia was when they mentioned famous personalities that had been involved with the company in the past (and present). Entertainers and athletes aligned with Olivia have included stars such as Melissa Etheridge, Heart, KD Lang, Missy Higgins, Paula Cole, Billie Jean King, Martina Navratilova and the Storm’s own Sheryl Swoopes. No other GLBT mention, even though olivia.com literally announces that it's "Where Lesbians Go."

The New York Liberty are going to play an outdoor game this year. It marks the very first regular season game of it's kind in pro-ball. Male or female.

Tamika Catchings is working hard to rehab from last year's torn Achilles Tendon. She wants to help win the Fever a championship, and she really really wants to play in the Olympics.

WNBA Transactions:
* Nikki Teasley, who was my favorite Mystic two years ago and who I still love a lot, is pregnant. I was all excited for her, b/c a little Mystic baby! But then she got let go, for reasons that had nothing to do with her pregnancy. Raise your hand if you believe that. No, me either. Pretty crummy.
* Former Mystic, Stacey Dales retires from the Chicago Sky to focus on broadcasting.
* The Minnesota Lynx picked up Ashley Awkward. This is mostly notable because my sister will love her name. She came from Australia's WNBL, and it'll be interesting to see how she does in the WNBA.
* Sue Bird re-signed with the Seattle Storm.
* Yolanda Griffith gets signed to the Storm. Yes, they're collecting fairly old players, but I have the feeling that they're going to be really good.
* The Phoenix Mercury lock Dianna Taurasi down for another three years.
* The Mercury sign Yuko Oga from Japan. I don't know much about Japanese women's basketball (they'll be in the Olympic qualifiers in Spain in June), so I can't wait to see her play.

What I'm burning is your attire

Sometime this morning we should know if Brent Barry will be wearing purple and orange.

The after-shocks of Sunday's mind-numbingly embarrassing 116-86 loss to the Pistons. I'm divided on this. Yeah, they need to have some time to build a cohesive team, but at the same time Shaq's mouth appears to be writing checks that his body (and the team as a whole, it seems) can't cash. I guess we have little choice but to wait and see what happens.

To quote Sports Night, "it can't rain at Indian Wells." This article is especially cool, because I didn't know that this had been done before, and it was interesting to read the players' recollections.

The "big man club" doesn't really talk to one another, but that's alright with Shaq. I'm glad to see that he's not mad at Dwight Howard for taking on the nickname Superman. Even though "you can't give yourself a nickname." Why yes, I am feeling like quoting Sport Night as much as possible tonight. Thanks for asking.

Butler, Thomas, and Arenas all have setbacks in their returning from injury. I feel really bad for the Wizards, as they're an awesome team, but just can't escape from being injury laden.

Tony Parker is back to practicing with the Spurs. Damn.

One of the men responsible for the death of Michael Jordan's father is having trouble getting parole. Legal jargon and loopholes commence.

WNBA free agency is open. In list form here's some highlights:
* The Washington Mystics re-signed Alana Beard. YAY!
* The Minnesota Lynx signed Nakia Sanford (of the Mystics) to an offer sheet. The Mystics had five days to match or beat the offer.
* The Mystics matched the Lynx's offer. YAY!
* The Lynx picked up Anna DeForge.
* The Connecticut Sun (boo hiss) re-signed Lindsay Whalen (who I actually kind of like).
* Katie Douglas (boo hiss) (of the Sun) went to the Indianapolis Fever in exchange for Tamika Whitmore.
* As predicted, Swin Cash went to the Seattle Storm from the Detroit Shock in return for the number 4 pick in this year's draft.

Speaking of the Draft Day, the WNBA draft will be held on April 9th to coincide with the NCAA Women's Final Four.

The Mystics are holding open tryouts a week after the draft. I don't know what else to say about that, but it's kind of interesting. I wonder if other teams do that.